European Crisis
A one-word explanation on why the eurozone cannot inflate its way out of trouble: Spain!
, 10/05/2012
So, Germany seems to have pushed the inflation-phobia monkey off its back. Its finance minister has condoned real wage rises for German industrial workers and the head of the Bundesbank has acknowledged a readiness to allow German inflation to outpace that of the rest of the eurozone. After fifteen years of violating the Maastricht agreement […]
Europe’s potential gains from a silent alliance between Paris and Athens
, 09/05/2012
Greece and France go back a long, long way. The Greek revolution, that procured our small, and constantly problematic, nation-state, was a spinoff (to all intents and purposes) of the French revolution and the culmination of a Greek Enlightenment that owed everything to the French Enlightenment (and almost nothing to either its German or Scottish […]
On CNN Int and Democracy Now, commenting of the Greek and French elections
, 09/05/2012
On Monday 7th May, a day after the French and Greek elections, I was asked to comment on both these momentous results first by Amy Goodman, of Democracy Now, and a little later that day by Christiane Amanpour, CNN International. Both interviews covered quite a lot of ground and departed from the usual epidermic coverage we […]
'Plotting' an economics' rebellion? Featured on Deutsche Welle's mini video documentary on the INET Berlin Conference
, 02/05/2012
During the INET Berlin Conference, April 2012, DW tv spent a day with me, compiling this mini documentary on the INET Conference in general and my involvement in it in particular. You can watch it here: click the video entitled Economists Planning a Revolution. [Those of you who have missed my INET address, and can […]
Interview with China's '21st Century Business Herld'
, 02/05/2012
Just interviewed by Chinese business daily 21st Century Business Herald (21世纪经济报道|). Here is the Q&A, in English of course…
Interviewed by Christiane Amanpour, CNN International: The case for a European New Deal
, 29/04/2012
On Friday 27th April, Christian Amanpour interviewed me on CNN Int on the theme of Europe’s slow suicide by inane austerity. CLICK HERE FOR THE VIDEO. The transcript of our conversation follows (thanks to CNN for making it available to me):
A litmus test for the theory that Europe, in the end, ‘gets it right on the night’: Will it allow the EFSF to recapitalise banks directly?
, 29/04/2012
A currency union requires a unified banking sector. With one supervisory authority that keeps banks in check (and, hopefully, in awe), re-capitalises them when the need arises and, when this happens, takes a stake in them in exchange for the capital injected into the banks.
A chance for happiness for Europe’s unhappy family (*)
, 27/04/2012
Europe is an unhappy family. And like all unhappy families, its diverse forms of competing miseries, afflicting differently its different members, are the reason it cannot regain its poise. Divorce is looming. Only in Europe’s case, and this is where my analogy with families breaks down, divorce can never be cathartic. It stands no chance […]
Why Won’t Germany Turn? Joseph Halevi’s insightful analysis, circa 1995
, 25/04/2012
The question οn almost everyone’s lips is: “How long before Germany recognises that a new architecture is necessary to keep the Eurozone together?” Implicit in the question is a mistaken premise: that Germany’s view of the Eurozone is wrong, that its stance is predicated upon a mistaken analysis concerning the nature of Europe’s macroeconomy. Recently, […]
‘Die Deutschen drehen immer durch’: Interviewed by Tageszeitung 23rd April 2012
, 25/04/2012
While in Berlin, last week, I gave an extensive interview to Tageszeitung. Click here for the article, as it appeared on their website (you can use Google Translate if you have no German). Alternatively, you can read the pdf version of the print edition (complete with a weird photo…): Tageszeitung YV interview 23rd April 2012
The Modest Proposal in Eurointelligence (abridged version)
, 21/04/2012
Wolfgang Munchau kindly offered to publish a version of our Modest Proposal in Eurointelligence. Click here.
German Mercantilism and the Failure of the Eurozone, Guest Post by Heiner Flassbeck
, 21/04/2012
One of the most poignant analyses of the deeper causes of the Euro Crisis, amongst the many presented in INET’s Berlin Conference, was a paper entitled ‘German Mercantilism and the Failure of the Eurozone’, by Heiner Flassbeck. With the author’s kind permission, I reproduce it here for your benefit. Enjoy. (You can watch Heiner’s presentation […]
THE MODEST PROPOSAL AND THE DEMOCRATIC DEFICIT
, 18/04/2012
In an astute commentary on the INET panel in which I appeared (see here for the text), to talk about Europe’s future, Eves Smith had this to say: “It is worth noting that one of the questions after the various presentations on the Eurozone mess raised the issue of the ‘democratic deficit’. The various speakers […]
The Modest Proposal in Berlin – INET Conference, 13th April 2012
, 16/04/2012
The invitation to address INET’s Berlin Conference, and to deliver a fresh version of the Modest Proposal, gave me the impetus to revisit the latter. The extended summary below (of my INET talk) will soon spawn Version 3.0 of the Modest Proposal. Europe’s strategy for dealing with the Euro Crisis has been to ringfence, at […]
CBS’s 60 Minutes program on An Imperfect Union: Europe’s Debt Crisis. An ‘eyewitness’ assessment
, 09/04/2012
On 8th of April, CBS’s 60 Minutes featured a section on the Euro Crisis in which I appeared. Here is my account, and assessment, of it.
Europe’s April, and how to thwart it
, 08/04/2012
The editor of a Swedish magazine asked me to contribute a short piece that combines elements of my Global Minotaur with the address I am about to deliver at the INET conference in Berlin this coming week on the Future of Europe. Here is the piece I concocted. Its title is borrowed from T.S. Elliot’s […]
Europe’s Periphery: A postmodern version of Britain in the 1930s?
, 01/04/2012
While it is quite correct to draw parallels between the Crashes of 1929 and 2008, it is important to distinguish not only between the two eras but also between the different experiences of different nations within the same era. The simple, but not insubstantial, point of this post is that Europe’s Periphery is not in […]
My most recent radio piece on the Greek and European Crisis
, 30/03/2012
Click here for my latest, comprehensive, interview with Austin Hellenic Radio.
Keynesian Legacies neither Europe nor Keynes deserved: A critique of New and ISLM Keynesians in the context of Europe’s Crisis
, 28/03/2012
In a previous article, entitled On the Political Economy of Eurozone Bailouts – The curious case of Greece’s neoliberals, I took great pleasure in lambasting the internal inconsistency of Europe’s (and in particular Greece’s) neoliberals. In today’s article I cast a critical gaze at the ‘other camp’; that which consists of self declared Keynesians. The article […]
Politics as television by other means: Mrs Merkel telling us that Greece is here-to-stay and the ESM will co-exist with the EFSF
, 26/03/2012
In television, I was once told, you can never lose money by underestimating the intelligence of the audience. Mrs Merkel seems to have drawn heavily from that nugget of wisdom. Her take on it is that, in European politics, you cannot lose votes if you underestimate the electorate. Just keep telling them the same thing […]
Interviewed by Telepolis (German and English versions)
, 24/03/2012
Telepolis just published an interview of mine under the title Die Europäische Union zerbricht. For the original article, in German, click here. Below I copy my original answers in English.
Something not wholly uninteresting happened the other day at the EFSF
, 21/03/2012
In the midst of a great deal of inanity coming from Mr Klaus Regling, the head of the European Financial Stability Fund (EFSF), the precursor to the European Stability Mechanism (ESM) that will come ‘online’ later this year (assuming the German Parliament and Constitutional Court do not throw spanners in its works), one of his […]
Ringfencing Europe
, 18/03/2012
A Modest Proposal for a Decent European Future[1] Summary of presentation to be made on 13th April 2012, at INET’s Berlin Conference Session: The Future of Europe Abstract Europe is currently caught up in a false dilemma between current policies, which are contributing toward the eurozone’s disintegration, and a ‘federal move’ that cannot possibly unfold swiftly enough […]